- Wishbone: [about the panther squealing in the hills] Come around here, yer varmint, and I'll slice you into cutlets.
- Pete Nolan: We did, what you call in the Army, a strategic retreat.
- Jim Quince: Just stayed back and waited in case the herd stampeded, or in case they ran the other way.
- Gil Favor: And you wanted to be there to stop 'em. Beautiful, that's one of the most beautiful, flat-faced lies I ever heard in my life.
- Pete Nolan: Well, thanks for letting us tell it.
- Jim Quince: You know, it made us feel better.
- Wishbone: I gotta say one thing. If you don't build 'em up, you sure bust 'em down.
- Rowdy Yates: Well?
- Wishbone: That's what you were aiming to do, wasn't it?
- Rowdy Yates: I suppose.
- Jim Quince: No, I'm all right, I tell you.
- Rowdy Yates: You don't look it.
- Jim Quince: Well, I ain't never chase no beeves with my looks.
- Jess Clayton: Well, you just wait 'til we shake down a little bit. We gonna get those beeves to Abilene before they know they left Texas.
- Pete Nolan: If this was the Army, I'd say he was bucking for Sergeant.
- Gil Favor: That was a night. But now it's another day. This ain't Laredo, back on the open trail. Ain't no dancehalls, it's just scrub and dirt. Ain't no dance girls, just beeves, none of 'em knowing a two-step.
- Rowdy Yates: Yes, well, we're just gassing it up a little.
- Gil Favor: Well, exactly, that is the point. Let's get something straight, right now. Every drive starts from scratch, and so does every drover. And I won't stand for no belly-aching. You knuckle down to work, or so help me, I'll send you back to Laredo and you can ride herd in all the dancehall cows you want.
- Rowdy Yates: But we're only 3 days out.
- Pete Nolan: Yep!
- Jim Quince: Ah, I'll tell you, Mr Favor, when you been pushing cattle as long as I have, you get so you read the signs. No, them cattle ain't gonna cut out on me.
- Gil Favor: No. What you suppose those two doing over there, going out to pick flowers?
- Jim Quince: Holy smoke!
- Wishbone: You wanna stay up and talk? I'll stay up and listen.
- Gil Favor: Talk?
- Wishbone: You got something in your craw. I don't know the signs after all these years?
- Gil Favor: How many years has it been, Wish? How many drives?
- Wishbone: I don't believe much in counting. Just makes you feel that much older.
- Gil Favor: Yeah, it's funny how the years can sneak up on a man without him realising it. 'Til oneday's it a little bit harder to climb up in the saddle. And that bed grounding you been figuring on just a little further off each time. Night camping, a place to have some fun, chew the fat. Just another place to sleep so you can get through tomorrow.